Bullying

The Appleton Area School District (AASD) is committed to providing students with a safe, secure, and healthy school environment that allows all students to maximize their learning potential.

The Board of Education considers bullying to be detrimental to the health and safety of students and disruptive to the educational process and is prohibited. Education, intervention, awareness, and prevention exists for staff and students to ensure a learning environment that is free of bullying or intimidation.

What is bullying?

Bullying is deliberate or intentional behavior using words or actions, intended to cause fear, intimidation or harm. Bullying includes aggressive and hostile behavior that is intentional and involves an imbalance of power between the bully and the bullied and is behavior that is repeated over time rather than an isolated incident.

Bullying based on sex, race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, creed, pregnancy, marital or parental status, sexual orientation or physical, mental, emotional or learning disability or handicap in its education programs or activities is also prohibited by law and Board policy.

Positive Behavior Intervention and Supports (PBIS)

Positive Behavior Intervention and Supports (PBIS) is a systemic approach to proactive, school-wide discipline based on a RtI model.

PBIS applies evidence-based programs, practices, and strategies for all students to increase academic performance, improve safety, decrease problem behavior, and establish a positive school culture.

The PBIS model has been successfully implemented in thousands of schools in over 40 states, resulting in dramatic reductions in disciplinary interventions and increases in academic achievement. Data-based decision making is a hallmark of PBIS, allowing successes to be easily shared with all relevant stakeholders.

Currently, all of our neighborhood schools implement PBIS as their framework for character education. It also is the framework used to provide a safe, positive, consistent and predictable learning environment for all students, staff, and families.